"The issue today is the same as it has been throughout all history,
whether man shall be allowed to govern himself
or be ruled by
a small elite." --
Thomas Jefferson
We are told daily that GDP is up and our economy is moving
forward, but we are working longer and harder just to keep up,
and the quality of life seems to be deteriorating.
EPI's snapshot this week shows real income has declined for
most of us during the "recovery" of the past three years.
GDP is a bad measure of economic activity. It does not
measure the health of the economy, nor the well-being of its
citizens, only the agitation on the market side. Wars, crime,
alcoholism -- the economy's "bads" -- count just as much as the
"goods" of food and shelter.
Environmental damage is completely ignored. Actually, we
count the clean-up in GDP, but the original damage? Didn't
happen. Also see the current Bush defense of oil-based energy
policy. No longer does he doubt the science of climate change,
now he says our economy cannot afford to do anything about it.
Bill Clinton has labeled the claim "flat wrong." (What happened
to "Bull!"?) Clinton has, in fact, proposed an economic future
for America based on the development of energy technology.
An alternative measure to GDP -- the Genuine Progress
Indicator (GPI) -- which takes into account the facts on the
ground is actually down more than 45% since 1975.
GDP counts borrowing as earning. And growing debt is the
only explanation for the current rise in GDP. The value of goods
purchased, added together, equals Gross Domestic Product. This
is like adding your paycheck to your credit card balance and
calling the total your earnings.
Am I just a loyal liberal footsoldier dissing the good news of
GDP and exploiting the bad news of massive debt, falling incomes
and tepid employment growth, all for the prurient interest of my
fellow radic-libs? I don't think so.
I am more like the nonplussed Frenchman who objected to the US
invasion of a Middle East country on flimsy pretext. When the
adventure turned out to be a catastrophe, I was not surprised.
The economy is similar. I'm just happy economist jokes are less
offensive than French jokes.
The parallels are striking. The Bush-Cheney axis decides what
they are going to do, and the facts and "official" rationale are
relegated to the PR department, where they will be adjusted
daily for public consumption. In Iraq, the "imminent threat of
WMD" changed to "getting rid of Saddam" changed to "establishing
democracy."
With tax cuts, Bush first promoted them "because it's your
money" (talking about the surplus). Subsequently we learned it
wasn't our money, after all, it was our kids' money. But, don't
worry, it's not going to us anyway, it's going to the rich.
When things started to tank, tax cuts became "a necessary
measure to help the economy after the terrorist attacks." This
is, in fact, the line that sold Congress. Bull! One, 9-11 had a
mild effect at most on the economic trajectory. Airlines, for
example, suffered far more from fuel prices than from the
temporary discouragement of travellers. Two, and more to the
point, the Bush tax cuts and the shameless slicing away at our
social and educational programs cannot help the economy. That
policy gun is pointed 180 degrees away from the target. To
improve spending and consumer confidence, and thus demand for
domestic business, fiscal decisions should favor the middle and
lower class, not the rich.
Now he says, "Stay the course." If we are lucky, the course
is circular, because off the bow it looks like we are heading
straight for the rocks.
submitted by Mark
Schwebke
President AFT-Oregon mschwebk@pcc.edu
"He has the right to
criticize who has the heart to help."
-- Abraham Lincoln
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